Review: Wasted Space #07
Artist: Hayden Sherman
Color Artist: Jason Wordie
Letterer: Jim Campbell
Review by Steve J. Ray
Fisticuffs, space ships, action, and inter-stellar gas stations... this chapter of Wasted Space has it ALL! Get your heads under the Slurpee faucet... Get Wasted!
Damn, I love this comic!
We left last month's issue with Molly's shocking vision of the future, in which she saw Fury betraying them all. The opening scenes in this chapter had me confused at first, but I should have had more faith in the Mighty Moreci. He's a lot more reliable than any action figure shaped deity.
Ah Look Like Ah'm Kiddin'?
Part of the magic of this series is the way it can blend political and social commentary, with insanity, hi-jinks and humour. Wasted Space makes me laugh out loud, as often as it makes me stop and think. How many floppy funny books can you say that about?Michael Moreci is a writer's writer. You can see that he has opinions and that he voices them in his stories using character interaction. The beauty part is that other characters have opposing or contrasting opinions. This makes readers feel like they're part of an ongoing conversation, and not like they're being preached to. This is hugely important.
Molly and Billy are two people with wildly contrasting viewpoints on life, but they're friends. They talk, they argue, they disagree... yet they're team-mates and their bond is strong. I don't think that I've ever felt such a connection with, or within, a group of characters that has only appeared in half a dozen comics. These people react, act and talk like folk that I've known all my life. These characters feel like family.
Come Git Mah Guns
Family. It seems like the creators on this title feel that way about each other too. Everything in this series just gels.Script and art, art and color, letters, art and dialogue. This is a weird and wonderful baby, but with every page, conversation, with every flash of color, carefully laid out caption, or sound effect; you feel that this baby, odd as it is, is dearly loved by its parents. Look... just above this paragraph. Billy's actions clearly leave poor Molly exasperated. That's what Michael Moreci scripted, and that's what Hayden Sherman and Jason Wordie have delivered, using deceptively simple, yet beautifully expressive art.
These guys provide more emotion and real human behaviour with a few lines of detail, and splashes of colour, than other titles could ever hope to achieve. Nothing else is required, it's perfect. If any book teaches us the power of restraint, and that less is more, Wasted Space is that title.
It takes years of hard work, and learning your craft, to make things look that easy.
You Touch It, You Bought It
Jim Campbell is the man.This issue gifts readers with a beautiful little look behind the scenes at the creative process. Right at the back of the book we see how some of these pages were put together. If you've ever wondered just how much a color artist or letterer contributes to a comic, look no further. It annoys me that I'm one of very few reviewers/critics who tries to comment on the efforts of every member of the creative team. This little segment in the back pages of Wasted Space #7 does more to highlight the work of these hugely talented people than I ever could.
Read this issue, take in how much dialogue is in there. Could you lay all that out and make it clear and legible, bearing in mind that there's art that will be covered up by your letters?
There are some comics out there that are beautifully written and drawn, but are spoiled by badly positioned and laid out lettering. I'm sure that every reader can remember reading a comic where they've had to go back and re-read a page, or more, because their eyes followed the letters, which hadn't followed the flow of the page.
That won't happen reading Wasted Space. Jim Campbell is the man.
Conclusion
This issue has laid the foundations for the future, delivering a few shocks and surprises on the way. Billy, Dust and Molly are on a mission to destroy the Creator, almost like an anti-Blues Brothers. Can Legion be trusted, now that we know he and G.I. G.O.D. are in cahoots?I've got to hand it to Dust this month, as his handling of Fury was absolutely jaw-dropping. Yeah, Boy Blue totally crushed it, this issue.
I'd like #8 now, please?
Images Courtesy Of Vault Comics And The Creative Team
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